| 释义 |
spread eagle, n.
Also spread-eagle.
[spread ppl. a.]
1. a. A representation of an eagle with body, legs, and both wings displayed, esp. as the emblem of various states or rulers, or as an inn-sign.
1570Foxe A. & M. (ed. 2) 388/1 The emperour..caused other mony to be made of leather, which on the one syde had his image, and on the other syde the spread egle. 1590in Archaeol. (1884) XLVIII. 154 One dammaske table clothe wrought with ye Spreed Egle of vij yerdes long. 1602J. Willis Art Stenographie E 5, This Character, bearing the similitude of a Spread Eagle, may signifie the Romaine Empire, being the Ensigne thereof. 1685Wood Life (O.H.S.) III. 160 At the Spread Eagle (commonly called the Spread Crow). 1701Luttrell Brief Rel. (1857) V. 81 Some flags are made here with a spread eagle upon them, the arms of his imperial majesty. 1723Pres. St. Russia I. 115 Post-boys..have no Post-Horns, but only the Mark of the Spread-Eagle. 1854Poultry Chron. II. 27 The annual dinner will take place at the Spread Eagle on Thursday.
Comb.1663Dryden Wild Gallant ii. i, I use to tell him of his two capon's tails about his hat, that are laid spread-eaglewise to make a feather.
b. A figure in fancy-skating.
1824Miss Mitford Village Ser. i. (1863) 15 He admired, with an ardour and sincerity never excited by..the spread-eagles of the Seine and the Serpentine. 1868Hurst Johnian Mag. X. 343 As I am writing for young skaters I may as well mention the ‘spread eagle’, a feat of not much value.
c. A boastful or self-assertive person.
1881Blackmore Christowell i, It may be denied by young spread-eagles, of competitive and unruly mind, that this is the highest form of human life.
2. A person secured with the arms and legs stretched out, esp. in order to be flogged.
1785Grose Dict. Vulgar T., Spread eagle, a soldier tied to the halberts in order to be whipped, his attitude bearing some likeness to that figure, as painted on signs. 1792Grose's Olio 228 Should you be caught, you know the consequence—That the spread eagle is your certain lot. 1834Marryat P. Simple (1863) 38 Mr. Jenkins desired the other men to get half-a-dozen foxes and make a spread eagle of me. 1882Daily Tel. 12 Sept. 2/2 The iron-hard pressure of it pins you against the shrouds as if you had been made a spread-eagle.
fig.1871Froude Table-T. Shirley 149, I suppose I shall as usual be made a spread-eagle by the Saturday [Review].
3. A fowl flattened out for broiling.
1854‘C. Bede’ Verdant Green ii. vii, Spread-eagle is a barn-door fowl smashed out flat, and made jolly with mushroom sauce. 1865Visc. Milton & W. B. Cheadle N.W. Passage by Land ii. (1867) 22 We manage at last to pluck and split open the ducks into ‘spread-eagles’, roasting them on sticks, Indian fashion.
4. U.S. Stock Exchange
a. An operation by which a broker agrees to buy shares of stock within a specified time at a specified price, and sells the option of buying shares of the same stock within the same time at a higher price.
b. = spread n. 10. Cf. straddle n. 2 a.
1857Merchants' Mag. XXXVII. 136 The buyer can call when he pleases, which would compel the ‘spread eagle’ operator to deliver. 1870J. K. Medbery Men & Myst. Wall St. 86 One modification of this is the Spread Eagle, formerly a highly popular style of speculation with capitalists who had plenty of money and a wide-awake broker. 1910Encycl. Brit. V. 55/1 A combined option of either calling or putting is termed a ‘straddle’, and some⁓times on the American stock exchange a ‘spread-eagle’.
5. attrib.
a. High-sounding, grandiloquent.
1839Morn. Post 21 Sept., The notion of lifting him with a spread-eagle title into the chief saloon.
b. U.S. Bombastic, extravagant, ridiculously boastful, esp. in laudation of the United States.
In allusion to the figure of the eagle on United States flags, etc.
1858Harper's Wkly. 28 Aug. (Thornton), The sermon was a splendid failure,..and is yet laughed at as the ‘Spread Eagle sermon’. 1858N. Amer. Rev. Oct. 454 It pleases our English critics to charge upon American writers in the mass..what has come to be designated as ‘the spread-eagle style’—a compound of exaggeration, effrontery, bombast, and extravagance. 1894H. H. Gardener Unofficial Patr. 125 You've read a lot of spread-eagle stuff, I don't doubt.
c. Aggressively assertive of United States interests or claims.
1885Pall Mall G. 2 Jan. 2/1 The new form of spread-eagle policy which the past year had witnessed.
6. attrib. Suggestive of the form or appearance of a spread eagle.
spread-eagle orchid, a popular name (U.S.) for the orchid Oncidium Carthaginense.
1856‘Stonehenge’ Brit. Rur. Sports 376 That ‘spread-eagle’ style of gallop which destroys a horse's chances at once. 1881Mahaffy Old Gk. Educ. iii. 32 Wild swinging of their arms, in spread-eagle fashion. 1894Daily Tel. 7 May 5/4 The ‘spread-eagle’ system adopted by cyclists, who straggle all over the road.
7. quasi-adv. Like a spread eagle, with arms and legs outstretched.
1922Joyce Ulysses 492 A blond feeble goosefat whore..lolls spreadeagle in the sofacorner. 1954Sun (Baltimore) 16 Jan. 12/2 He told the two men to stand ‘spread eagle’ against the wall of a building while Joseph L. Klingenberg..frisked them. 1973W. H. Hallahan Ross Forgery iv. 59 Ross stripped the klutz of all his clothes and staked him spread-eagle to the ground under a tropical sun. |